National Furniture employs salespersons for it’s retail sales facilities.  These individuals are trained as professionals in the furniture market.  They are taught the specific niche that the company’s brands fill in the market, and learn how to carefully identify the needs of customers, and to recommend appropriate products.  The management remains in constant contact with it’s sales force because they are continually in contact with customers.  The customer feedback received from the sales force has provided valuable insight into new products and services.

The retail personnel are also taught how to follow-up on leads they receive.  As inquiries come in from prospective clients (whether homeowners or business professionals), the retail personnel send direct letters to these persons offering a consultation and written, customized assessment of their furnishing needs.  High-end clients have proven especially responsive to this strategy.

However, the rise in popularity of interior design consultants has made the job of the retail sales personnel more difficult than merely selecting furniture based on a customer's request.  Increasingly, customers come to National Furniture without a specific request in the hope that the personnel will not only recommend a type of furniture based on their description, but will actually be able to describe options in furnishing strategies to them.

Currently, the retail personnel are not trained to perform this task.  The company has hired three full-time interior design consultants to do this work, but these persons are often out, either doing their own selling, or servicing a client.  Thus, National Furniture has committed to retraining each of it’s retail personnel in advanced interior design and decor planning, and now plans to advertise the expertise of it’s retail personnel.  Since advertising has traditionally been very effective, and since interior design services are in such demand in the area, it is expected that these strategies will work together to produce a substantial number of new leads, both for the interior design consultants, and for the retail furniture sales force.

In order to effectively monitor and respond to changes in customer needs and wants, National Furniture has initiated a customer feedback mechanism.  With every sale of furniture or interior design assistance, included is a business reply postcard asking the customer to provide them with information pertaining to their satisfaction with the products or services and with the company itself, as well as the customers’ plans regarding furniture or design needs in the future.  Similarly, these evaluation cards are made available in the showrooms at National Furniture.  The company periodically evaluates the responses in order to more effectively serve it’s customers and strategically plan the future direction of the business based, in part, on the feedback the customers provide.  This feedback, in part, led to the creation of the interior design service concept in response to customer demand.

The following table (Sales Targets) displays historical sales data for the company, as well as it’s current and projected sales: